


Blizzard

by Ichabodjane



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Blizzards & Snowstorms, Comedy, F/M, Fluff, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-19
Updated: 2015-02-19
Packaged: 2018-03-13 20:23:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3395201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ichabodjane/pseuds/Ichabodjane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Camp Jaha hunkers down to ride out a blizzard.  Driven crazy by her friends' drunken antics, Clarke decides to hang out with Bellamy instead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blizzard

It had been a mild winter so far. Or at least, that's what the Grounders said. But for Bellamy and the other Arkers, nothing about that winter felt mild. The carcass of the Ark, which had once been perfectly adequate protection against the emptiness of space, turned out to be complete crap at fending off the biting winds and driving rains of Earth. Drinking water froze overnight and had to be broken open with hatchets every morning. Frost made the ground hard and killed off edible plants. And more often than not, the hunting parties came back empty handed.

In fact, if it hadn't been for the Grounders, most of us would have been dead. 

It was a strange thought, Bellamy mused as he walked across Camp Jaha. Strange, but true. Not long after the battle at Mt. Weather, the temperatures had plunged. It was the Grounders who had taught them how to turn trees into cabins and how to make reeds into thatched roofs and stuff moss and mud between the logs to block out the winter weather. It was the Grounders who taught them how to turn animal skins into clothing and where to find plant roots under the frozen soil. Now, most of his people at least had shelter and food, small though the rations were. 

Not that it hadn't come with a price. A barter system had quickly emerged- Grounder skills and resources for Ark tech and manufactured goods. The Grounders might know how to cure deerskin, but they hadn't yet figured out how make glass or stainless steel. So every day, Grounders showed up at the entrance of the camp, ready to trade.

And this morning was no different. Bellamy could see a knot of Arkers and Grounders milling around the open gates, swapping items and negotiating prices. Everyone seemed at ease. Some Arker and Grounder kids were running around in some sort of tagging game that seemed to require a lot of screaming. A few months ago, he would never have believed this could happen. But, as it turned out, most of the Grounders were people the same as them. They wanted the same things his people wanted. Warmth. A full stomach. Freedom.

Well, most of them. He sighed as he saw Indra, standing just outside the gates with her entourage. He was pretty sure Indra still hated them all and would happily slit their throats while they slept, if only Lexa allowed it. The only sky person she thought worth her time was Octavia, who was half-Grounder already. His sister definitely looked the part, with her braided hair and ten different kinds of knives hanging off of her body. But her face still broke into that same familiar smile when she saw him approach.

He didn't go to hug her. Indra didn't approve of affection and he knew Octavia was still trying to make a good impression. So instead, he just smiled and said, “Morning, O,” before nodding to Indra, “Someone said you were looking for me. What can I do for you?” He left out that it had been a terrified six year old, pounding on his door, whimpering that "the scary Grounder lady said to find you or she'll eat me for dinner".

Indra's face looked like she had sucked on a lemon, as his mother would have said. “I asked for Clarke. The Commander has a message to give to her. Where is she?”

“Clarke's busy. You can give me the message.”

“The message is for Clarke. Not you.”

Bellamy hooked his thumbs in his belt loops. His hands ached from cold and he wanted to stuff them in his pockets. But showing such weakness in front of Indra was a bad idea. “If Lexa thought the message was one only Clarke could hear, then she would have come herself. She didn't. So it can't be so important that I can't take it. So it looks like you get to deal with me.” Octavia flashed him a warning look, but he ignored it. In the Grounders' eyes, Clarke was the commander of the Sky People. Which meant that Indra didn't get to summon Clarke to the gates whenever she felt like it. No matter how many kids she scared.

Indra's nostrils flared and he could almost hear her teeth grinding together. But he matched her glare for glare, until she finally spat, “Tell your Clarke that there is a storm coming. There will be snow and great winds. Tonight or tomorrow. It will last for a day, maybe more. Your people need to be in shelter when the winds come. Anyone left outside will die.” 

“How do you know its coming?”

Indra snorted, “We can read the signs. It is obvious to anyone with half a brain. But apparently, not to the Sky People.” And with that, she turned and stalked away. Octavia followed her, throwing him an apologetic smile over her shoulder and mouthing sorry. Bellamy would have liked a few minutes to talk to her, to ask how the search for Lincoln was going, to make sure she was doing alright. But that would have to wait. Apparently, they had preparations to make.

***

The Council Chamber was cold. No, not cold. Frigid. Clarke rubbed her hands together, trying to keep some feeling in them while she listened to Miller give the latest report on the condition of their food supplies. Kane and Sinclair didn't look much warmer. Raven was so miserable that she looked downright murderous. Clarke couldn't figure out why Abby insisted on having meetings in here, when Clarke's cabin had been built larger than the others, specifically so that they could have their gatherings in a place with a fire and not in the damn Arctic. Maybe she wanted to feel like she still had some control in the camp. Though her mother was highly respected for her healing skills, it still upset her that it was to Clarke that people looked for leadership, for reassurance. Clarke could see it on her face every day, particularly in these meetings. Abby usually took her frustration out on Bellamy, whose opinions were almost always the opposite of hers, and Clarke had lost count of how many meetings had broken down into those two bickering. Which made Bellamy's absence from this one all the more notable. But it wasn't long before he made an appearance, edging through the half-open door as Clarke dismissed Miller.

“Glad to see you've finally graced us with your presence,” Abby said.

Bellamy ignored the barb, speaking instead to Clarke, “Indra showed up with a message from Lexa. She says there's a snowstorm coming. High winds. Said being caught out of shelter'll be a death sentence.”

“What, like a blizzard?” Raven asked, “Isn't that just fan-fucking-tastic.”

Clarke leaned forward, “When?”

“Today,” Bellamy said, “Maybe tomorrow. Could last a day or two, she said.”

“And how does Lexa know this?” Abby asked, “Grounders don't exactly have radar.”

Clarke saw Bellamy's jaw twitch the way it did when he was prepping for a fight, “Grounder know-how, I guess. But since they've seen about ninety-seven more winters than we have, I think I'm gonna go with their opinion.”

Clarke thumped her hands on the table as she stood. If there was a blizzard coming, they didn't have time for one of Abby and Bellamy's bust-ups. “Bellamy's right. Lexa wouldn't have sent the message if she didn't mean it. We need to call everyone together and make an announcement. We have to get enough supplies together so everyone can take shelter in the cabins for a few days. Mom, make sure people have any medicine they need. Marcus, can you go after Miller and help him distribute the rations? Raven, you and Wick go over the fence and the buildings; shore up any weak spots as best you can. Sinclair, see if we can get people extra clothing and blankets.”

Raven saluted, “You got it, boss lady.”

“Fitting nick name,” Bellamy said when it was just them left.

Clarke rolled her eyes, leaning on the table next to him, “I don't care what she calls me, as long as she does it. How was Indra?”

He folded his arms, “She sent Brax to come get me. Told her she'd eat him if he didn't. So, you know, the usual ray of sunshine. But she seemed pretty serious about the storm.”

Clarke rubbed her hands over her face, “Well, if I remember my Earth history correctly, blizzards can be pretty horrific. So....hurray for us.”

He put a hand on her shoulder, “Hey, we've got the rations to last us. Most of us aren't living in tents anymore, so we have the shelter. We'll be okay, Princess.”

He was trying to make her feel better. But he also didn't say things if they weren't true, especially where their prospects of survival were concerned. She could always count on him for that. So she offered him a tired smile and said, “That reminds me. We need to take the survivors who came in from Tesla Station and get them into cabins, wherever people have room to spare.”

“No problem,” he nodded, “I'll get Monty to help.”

They walked into the corridor. “Why do you need Monty?” she asked.

“People actually like Monty,” he pointed out.

“People like you, too, you know,” she replied, “You would know that if you actually had a sustained conversation with someone.”

He didn't say anything, just hmphf'd. Clarke would have pressed the matter but they had reached outside, where everyone was gathering to hear what Clarke had to say. Bellamy called for silence and then stepped back, letting her take the lead.

“Okay, everyone! Here's what going on...”

The snow started falling from the sky not long after the sun fell behind the trees. It was a gentle snow at first, made up of big fat flakes that drifted almost lazily through the air. Everyone stopped and stared, even Clarke. She had seen pictures and films of snow before. But that was nothing compared to actually experiencing it- the way it brushed her face like feathers and stuck to her eyelashes and hair. It only took a few minutes for the stuff to start accumulating on the ground and on the roofs of their little houses. And only a few more minutes for people to ball it up and throw it at each other. Clarke let them. It wasn't often that they had a chance to play around like this. 

But then the dark gathered and the wind rose and the feathers turned into tiny knives, biting at exposed skin. Clarke made her way through camp, overseeing the final preparations. She saw Bellamy moving around, too- helping someone tighten down a tarp, corralling kids back to their parents, yelling at Jasper to quit messing around with the snow and do his damn job. Kneeling down to talk to a small girl who was upset about something. She wanted to go ask him if he had remembered to get his own supplies together but Miller cut into her path, saying something about potatoes, and she had to leave it.

She didn't see him again, even though she was the last one into the cabins, heading inside just as the wind rose into a crazed howl. She had to fight to get the door shut, pulling against the strength of the wind until the wooden latch clunked into place. She turned and leaned against it with a sigh, ready to finally take a rest.

Resting, however, did not seem to be on the agenda. With the door shut against the weather, she could finally hear the cacophony going on inside. Most of the space was taken up by a large table and chairs (intended for the council meetings that never happened there). That table was usually covered in a jumble of tools, wires, and various machine parts- the detritus of Wick and Raven's work. All of that, however, had been pushed to one side or scattered around the floor. Most of the table surface was instead dominated by a motley assortment of pots, tubs, hissing tubes. 

“How many times have I told you not to touch my fucking stuff!”

“Look, its just until the storm lets up! Bellamy won't let us have it in the cabin and that room in the Ark was totally open to the elements so we couldn't leave it there! Can't you just leave that stuff on the floor?”

“How's about I smash that still apart and leave that on the floor!”

On the other side of the table, near the fire pit, Raven and Jasper were in each other's faces, with Monty in the middle trying ineffectually to keep them apart. Wick leaned against the wall, not helping Raven but not looking like he wanted to stop her either.

Oh, for fuck's sake. So much for a quiet night indoors.

“Hey. Hey! What is going on?” she asked, edging around them to warm her hands on the fire.

“Ag station farm boy over here wrecked all my projects to make room for his stupid still,” Raven shoved Jasper hard in the shoulder.

“I'm sorry, Clarke,” Monty put in, “I told him to just cover it up and leave it, but-”

“But its sensitive equipment,” Jasper insisted, wavering slightly in his feet, “It can't be left out in weather like this.”

“A) You aren't even supposed to be in here,” Clarke reminded him, “You and Monty bunk with Bellamy, remember? This is mine and Raven's- wait, is Bellamy over there alone? I said no one's supposed to be by themselves. It isn't safe, not when we can't go anywhere.”

“Yeah, but,” Jasper giggled, “He said he wanted some time to himself. And he's like...the most in charge after you, who is the most in charge, soooooo.....”

“I should add that that was after he told us to get the still out of there,” Monty added.

“And B,” she continued, “are you two drunk?”

“I'm not. He is,” Monty pointed to his friend, who was now smiling at Raven. She gave him a snort of disgust and turned away.

Clarke bit back a groan. Stuck in a cabin with a drunk Jasper and an irate Raven was not the way she had wanted to spend this blizzard. “Jasper, put the still on the floor and help Raven and Wick put their stuff back on the table. And then sit down and be as unobtrusive as possible or I swear to God, I will throw you out that door myself. Do you understand?”

Jasper sighed, flapping his lips like a horse, “Fiiiiiiiinnnnnnne.”

“I got your rations,” Monty said, pointing out a box by her cot, “And here's some dinner,” He handed her a bowl with the last of the night's stew and a hunk of flat bread. He was obviously in his Cover Up for My Dumbass Friend mode. “And I brought you some of this.” He pulled a large bottle out of a bag near his feet. It was full of clear liquid, “A peace offering on behalf of Jasper. Why don't you just sit down and I'll help him clean up.”

Clarke opened the bottle and took a sniff. Moonshine. Over a quart, by the look of it. She took a swig and went to sit down but was rudely interrupted by an explosion of feathers and indignant squawking.

“What the shit is that?!”

“He,” Jasper cried, grabbing the chicken up in his arms, “Is Lord Cluckington the Third! King of all the chickens!”

All Clarke was able to get out was a plaintive, “Why?” 

“Lord Cluckington can not be expected to weather such...such weather outside!” Jasper insisted, ignoring Monty's “You do know that's a girl chicken, right?”

She took another swig of 'shine. This was going to be a long blizzard.

By the next afternoon, things had not improved. The world was totally white outside the window (a small one scavenged from the Ark). The wind still screamed around them, forcing its way through even the smallest chinks in the walls, and even whipping down through the chimney from time to time, making the metal tube rattle loud enough to wake them from a dead sleep. With nowhere to go and nothing to do, they had started working their way through the moonshine by mid-morning. Clarke didn't have all that much. But the rest of them ended up rip-roaring drunk. 

Monty was explaining the process of hydro-farming to them for the sixteenth time, though by now Clarke wasn't even sure if he was speaking English. Jasper had chased Lord Cluckington around for a good half an hour, trying to make her cuddle, before losing interest and instead trying to make a tower out of every available item in the room. Lord Cluckington was wandering around, making loud shrieking noises every time Jasper tried to give her a throne at the top of the tower, which was once every five minutes. Wick and Raven were laying tangled in a blanket by the fire. Clarke was fairly certain she had heard them making out at some point in the night but now Raven was loudly telling jokes and then laughing at herself.

“Hey....hey, Wick! Wick, wake up, you asshole!” she reached up and smacked him in the face.

“Ow! What, I'm up! What!”

“What did one scientist say to the other scientist when he wanted...when he wanted to fight 'm?”

“Shit, I dunno.”

“Let me atom!” she yelled and then dissolved into giggles.

“No! Lord Cluckington! Come here at once! YOUMUSTTAKEYOURRIGHTFULPLACEONTHETOWER!” Jasper shrieked and the Lord Cluckington shrieked back.

“Clarker! Clarker, you not lishtening to me,” Monty mumbled, collapsing onto her shoulder “Dish...dish is very...important. What was saying?”

I am so fucking done with this. Clarke gently pushed Monty off and heaved herself up. She grabbed her rations and sketchbook and the biggest bottle of booze she could find. It didn't matter if she froze to death. She couldn't stay in here for another minute. Bellamy's cabin, the one that Jasper and Monty were supposed to be in, was only about twenty yards away. And she was just drunk enough to think this was a good idea. She grabbed her blanket and was about to head out the door when Raven stood up and blocked her path.

“Where you going?” she demanded. Wick pulled on her good leg, begging her to lay back down and complaining about how he was he was now a “little ice cube of sadness.”

“Out,” Clarke smiled broadly, “Its fine. Just lay back down.”

“No!” Raven insisted, “Its like...ten kinds of fucked up out there. Snow and shit. Can't go out. Snow. And shit.”

“Its going to be fine,” Clarke clapped her on the shoulder, “Wick is a sad little ice cube. You should go fix that.”

Suddenly, Raven's expression went from angrily confused to delighted, “I know where you going! You going to Bellamy's!”

“No! Well, maybe. So what?”

Raven giggled, “I know what you're doing. You're gonna go git some of thaaaaaaat,” she started doing a strange rocking dance, “Clarke's gonna go git some of thaaaaaaat.”

“Shut up!” Clarke felt herself blushing, “I am not going to get anything!”

“Clarke's gonna go git some of thaaaaaat!” Raven kept singing. Monty joined her, then Jasper and Wick.

“I am not going to get anything!” she yelled, “I am just going out! That's it!”

Raven shushed the rest of them. She clapped her hands onto Clarke's cheeks, squishing them together and holding her head still as she fixed her with a serious look, “Look, we all know what you want. Its like...totally about time this happened. You guys been eye-fucking each other for months. He went into Mount Weather for you. I know you feel guilty about that. But you shouldn't. Cause he woulda done it anyway. Cause he, like, loves you and shit. He'd totally kill people for you. And you are totally love him back. You kill people for him, too. You idiots all kinds of in love. And we all know it. We're all like 'when the hell they gonna make out already? When the hell they gonna fuck?' So you should just go do that. Like, just go do it. Might cheer him up a bit. Its definitely gonna cheer you up. So you tell me- you tell Raven right now. Tell me you gonna go do that. Say 'yyyeeeeess'” she forced Clarke's head up and down in nod.

“I'm noth-” Clarke tried to talk but Raven abruptly released her face and shoved her towards the door.

“Go do it already, boss lady! Go give him that boss lady booty! Trust me, its gonna be good! I should know!”

“Wait, what?” Wick asked.

Clarke didn't wait to hear Raven's reply. She just yanked the door open and threw herself out of it.

***

Bellamy had decided that blizzards weren't so bad. It was a bit boring but a bit boring was a welcome change after the insanity of the last few months. He had slept most of the night through, which didn't happen often, and he had eaten no less than two meals without being interrupted, also an unusual phenomenon. And he finally had time to start sewing together the pile of rabbit furs sitting in the corner of the cabin. That was what he was doing when the door slammed open and the blizzard came screaming inside, carrying Clarke with it.

“Jesus, Clarke!” he yelled, getting up to push the door shut, “What the hell are you doing?!”

“Hi!” she said cheerfully, leaning forward to help him shut out the driving snow, “How are you?”

“Why were you outside?” he asked, “What's wrong? What's going on?”

“Ieeeeeee,” she hesitated, dragging out the sound, “don't think anything is wrong with anyone. I mean, there's a lot wrong with Jasper, but that's an ongoing thing.”

“Then why did you go outside? Did you maybe forget that there's a blizzard outside?”

“I didn't forget,” she said, “I just...wanted to see how you were doing. No one's supposed to be alone, you know.”

His brow furrowed, “Jasper and Monty ended up at your place, didn't they?”

“They're drunk,” she leaned back on the door, letting her head thunk into the wood, “Raven is drunk. Wick is drunk. I think Raven and Wick may have had sex last night. Jasper has a chicken. A fucking chicken. In my cabin. Its name is Lord Cluckington.”

Bellamy raised his eyebrows, “Are you drunk?”

“Belllaaaaammmmmyyyy, don't make me go baaaaack. Please?” she made a pouting expression. He took that as a yes.

He found himself wanting to smile and pressed his lips together to hide it. “Well now that you're here, you may as well stay.”

“I brought you something to make it better!” she shook a bottle of moonshine in his face, grinning like a maniac.

“Well, Princess, looks like you just made it a party.”

She filled him in on the antics of the day, sitting close to the fire and eating her way through his ration of smoked trout. He had insisted on switching it for her jerky. Smoked trout was her favorite and he knew she had been skipping meals whenever the food stores got low, insisting that others needed it before her. It was both an endearing and infuriating quality, her habit of putting others before herself. It made her a good leader but, in his opinion, kind of a danger to herself. 

“So then Jasper decided to build a tower and put the fucking chicken in it and the fucking chicken won't stop fucking screaming so I pretty much had to leave if I wanted to keep my sanity,” she finished her story and the last of the fish. She eyed her empty fingers sadly before licking the last of the flavor off of them, “Sorry to ramble for so long,” she threw him an apologetic glance, “Its just been kind of an aggravating day.”

“Its fine,” he told her. Honestly, he could listen to her ramble forever. It was the longest he had ever heard her talk about trivial things, instead of the life and death matters that usually made up their conversations. He wondered if their lives would ever be safe enough to do that, to talk about stupid things like Jasper's chicken more than they talked about who might not make it through winter. 

Never. It would probably never happen. 

He took another drink. It wasn't half-bad, really. The liquid itself didn't have much of a taste but it left an honest, comforting burning from his mouth to gut. He had had enough of it now that it left his head pleasantly fuzzy, too.

“So Wick and Raven, huh?” he asked, “Can't say I didn't see that coming.”

“Yeah? I didn't know you paid attention to Raven's love life,” Clarke reached across him to take the bottle.

“You don't have to pay attention. They're about as subtle as a kick in the face.”

She laughed, “Yeah, true. I'm glad she can find someone. You know, after-”

“I know.”

She took a rather large drink and stared at the dirt floor, “I'm glad she doesn't hate me.”

“You did what you could for Finn,” Bellamy said, “We all know that, Raven included.” Clarke didn't say anything, just picked at a spot on the floor. She was getting into one of her moods- the self-hating one, where she decided that she was actually a horrible person. Which was so ridiculously far from the truth... He leaned over, pushing her shoulder with his, “Hey, she sounded pretty happy last night, didn't she?”

“Ugh, the noises they were making,” she rolled her eyes, “It was so awkward. They must have though we were all passed out.”

Bellamy considered this, “Or they didn't care.”

“She said- when I was leaving, she said-” Clarke began. But she abruptly clapped her hand to her mouth, as though the words had come out without her telling them to.

“What'd she say?” he wanted her to keep talking about stupid things. Things that didn't matter. “Bet it was funny.”

“N-nothing, it wasn't anything important,” her face was flushing, turning a beet red.

“You okay, Clarke?” he asked.

“Yeah, fine!” she said brightly, rubbing her cheeks, “Just, you know, cold.”

“Come here,” he pulled the blanket off of his bed and wrapped it tightly around them both, “Better?”

She nodded, though he noted that her cheeks were just as red. Which was strange. Being cold didn't make your face red like that. He frowned. What made your face red like that? Blushing. Being embarrassed. Or nervous. But why should she be that? His moonshined brain was having trouble finding an answer. This was bad. He shouldn't be this drunk. What if they got attacked? How could he protect them all- how could he protect her- if he was drunk? The wind gusted, rattling the window and reminding him that no one was attacking in this weather. Still...he couldn't figure out why she was blushing...

“What are you making?” she asked, jolting him out of his thoughts. She had pulled the half-sewn rabbit furs into her lap, “Its pretty.”

“Its a coat. Or it will be.”

“Where'd you learn to sew like this?” she pulled her knees up and laid her head down, so her face was laying on the furs, “Its really nice.”

“My mother taught me and Octavia when we were kids. Sewing clothes, fixing them, that was her job.”

“Aurora. That was her name, right?”

He nodded. It felt good to her his mother's name spoken by someone else. Someone who seemed to cared about knowing it.

“She must have been really good at it.”

“Better than me, that's for sure,” he smiled into the fire, “She used to get on our case a lot, though. I always cut the thread too long and it would get tangled. And Octavia was never patient enough to finish anything. O was never really into sitting still.”

“It seems like a family trait,” Clarke observed.

“Yeah, maybe.” He planned to leave it at that, but somehow found himself continuing, telling her stories about growing up. About hiding Octavia under the floor. About giving her rides through imaginary jungles and oceans. About the day she was born. From there, he started talking about the books his mother had read to them, all ancient history and mythology. Worlds far away from their tiny little room on a cramped station in space. Eventually he fell silent, his stories done, unsure how he had started speaking in the first place.

He turned to Clarke, wondering if she had fallen asleep. But she was awake and looking at him with an expression he hadn't seen much before. He blinked, trying to place it. Contentment. That was it. She was content. To be there, with him, in a snowstorm. He suddenly felt warm in a way that had nothing to do with the moonshine. Not knowing how to feel about that, he decided that the best course of action was to steal the bottle from her and take another drink.

“Don't hog it all,” she grumbled, reaching to take it back.

He held it out of her reach, “I can handle more. I've got half a foot and many pounds of muscle on you.”

“Fuck off, you're not that much taller,” she grabbed his sleeve and tried unsuccessfully to pull his arm, and the bottle, closer.

“You've been drinking since this morning,” he pointed out.

“I. Am. Fine,” she punctuated each word with a lunge for the bottle. She was draped completely across him now, one hand reaching and the other planted on his shoulder for balance. She was close enough that he could smell her, a smell that was uniquely and intoxicatingly Clarke, even underneath the dirt and woodsmoke that clung to everything. Her face was only a few inches from his. Close enough to smell the alcohol on her breath. Close enough to kiss.

He cleared his throat and handed her the bottle, “Whatever you say, Princess. Just don't come crying to me when you're hungover and puking tomorrow.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” she muttered before taking a drink. 

He must be well and truly drunk. He never talked about his childhood, to anyone, and he certainly never let himself have thoughts like that. He couldn't afford to let himself think like that. They had people to protect, to keep alive. If he followed those thoughts, if she had them too...how could she tell him to do the things they needed to do? The things that could get him killed. The things he insisted on doing so that she would never have to.

“She's going to be okay, you know.”

“Huh?”

“Octavia. She's going to be okay,” Clarke sat back, letting her head fall onto the bed behind them and staring pensively at the thatch, “I know you worry about her out there. I do, too. But this is what she wants to do. She thought she was gonna spend her life in a box and now...now she gets to take control of her own...I dunno, her own fate. That's the great thing about Earth. Its scary as hell. But if you do it right, you can do things you never thought you could. Never thought you should.”

Do things you never thought you should. He found himself staring at the perfect curve of her mouth. It opened and she licked her bottom lip. Damn it, was she trying to torture him? That wasn't even the thing she was talking about! He rubbed a hand over his face and forced himself to turn back to the fire.

“Bellamy?”

“Hmm?” he responded, not trusting his voice to remain steady.

“Will you be honest with me about something?”

“Always.”

Her smile was brief but it happened, “Am I a good leader? Am I doing the right thing by our people?”

“If I didn't think you were, I would tell you,” he said.

She raised her head to meet his gaze, her bright blue eyes boring into his, “You don't think we should have gone with Jaha? Or made for the ocean? Or given the command over to my mom?”

He crooked an eyebrow, “You know my opinion of your mother's opinions. Jaha was a madman following a story that's barely more than a legend. And there's no way of knowing if there's food near the ocean. Or another bunch of Grounders to hate us. Or if we'd reach it before winter hit. Staying here was the right call. And besides, you're our Princess. I don't think we could find another one as crazy as you.” What had Indra called her? Your Clarke. God, he wished.

***

“Crazy, huh? Well thanks for the honest opinion,” she said. She searched his face for a hint of sarcasm. But she couldn't find any. As usual, he told her the truth, without twisting or sugarcoating it. It was one of her favorite things about him. Her mother might bristle at his inclusion on the council, seeing him as not much better than a miscreant and a reckless, rebellious miscreant at that. And he was all those things, for sure. But he was also brave and selfless and smart and plain-spoken and also, to be perfectly honest, devastatingly attractive. Especially in the firelight, as the night grew outside and...how long had she been staring at him? How long had he been staring at her?

They looked away from each other, back to the fire. “You know, I used to hate it when you called me that. Princess.”

“I know. That's why I did it.”

She shook her head, “You're such an ass, sometimes.”

“I thought it was half the time,” he smiled a crooked smile.

“Fine, half the time.”

They fell silent again, listening to the wind batter its way around the cabin. She couldn't stop herself from thinking about how good it felt to sit there next to him. Natural, like it was the way things were always supposed to be. I mean, it made sense, she tried to tell herself. He was beside her all the time. They ran the camp together. So of course it felt totally normal to sit next to him now. Yes, normal. And safe. And like it was the best place in the world.

“What did Raven say?” he asked after a few minutes.

“Huhwaitwhat?” she blinked, trying and failing to fight the blush rising yet again up her face. It was her damn pale skin. It made it so stupidly obvious.

“What did Raven say that makes your face so red?” he was staring at her cheek with a puzzled expression, “You don't usually do that.”

“Uuuuuhhh,” was the cleverest reply she could muster, “It wasn't anything. Just, you know, drunk people stuff. That people say. When they are drunk.”

“No, I don't know. That's why I asked.” 

“Oh, just. You know...stuff,” she was looking at the floor, the walls, her hands, everywhere but at him, “About...about us.”

She heard him swallow hard, “Yeah?”

“Mhm!” She tried to smile. Maybe if she pretended it was a joke, then he would let it go and they could move on. Because this felt dangerous. Like a tipping point. Or a crossroads. Something profound like that. “Apparently, everyone's been talking about us,” she tried to give a light-hearted laugh. Failed abysmally. Plowed on anyway, “Apparently, everyone's like,” she put on a fake-deep voice, “'Oh, when are they gonna sleep together because we think they should because of reasons!' Which is ridiculous, because...because...” Shit. She couldn't even remember why it was ridiculous. It was very important that she remembered why it was ridiculous. Damned moonshine.

“Yeah, totally stupid.” His voice was deeper, filled with something she couldn't name. But she felt it, deep in her gut, making her heart pound and her hands tremble.

Clarke made the mistake of looking at him. His face was close, really close, disastrously close. And he was staring at her as though he had never really seen her before. Or maybe like she was the only thing he had ever seen in his life. “Bellamy...” she whispered.

“Yes?”

The words came out without her thinking about them.

“If I asked you to, would you kiss me right now?”

“Are you?” he swallowed again, “Asking?”

She didn't answer. But she did lean forward, ever so slightly, and that was answer enough.

His mouth was soft but his kiss was hungry, greedy for her. It startled her at first but it was only a few seconds before she was pushing back, her body aching, screaming for him. It felt like she was waking up from a long sleep, finally letting loose all the desires that had been locked down so deep she had almost forgotten their existence. Her boots came off, then his jacket, then her shirt, then his shirt. It was black outside, but she could see his bare torso in the firelight, the muscles hardened by the labor of survival, the scars of injuries healed over. So many of them gained at her expense, because of what she had asked him to do. Clarke started tracing them with her fingers, a pang of guilt searing through her desire.

But Bellamy crushed her hand in his, pressing it to his face and laying a kiss on her palm. “Don't,” he begged her, “Just be here. With me.” He pulled her up onto his lap, so that both her legs could wrap around him, whispering her name over and over, punctuating each repetition with a kiss on her arm, her stomach, her shoulder, her collarbone. “Just stay with me,” he said. She was only too happy to oblige.

***

There was a pounding in Clarke's head. No, not in her head. On the door. A pounding on the door. Reluctantly, she cracked an eye open. Maybe if she could just get it to stop, she could go back to sleep. A face appeared in the window. Raven's face, wrapped up in a blanket.

“Ha! I fucking told you!” she yelled over her shoulder, “You owe me some damn jerky!” She turned back to knock on the window, “Snowstorm's over, losers. You coming out or what?”

Bellamy groaned and mumbled something that sounded like Fuck you. Clarke couldn't argue the sentiment. She was warm, finally really warm, for the first time in months, wrapped up under a pile of furs, her head resting on Bellamy's shoulder. Wait, what?

It took her a moment to remember it all. Fighting through the wind into Bellamy's place. Listening to his stories. Drinking moonshine. So much moonshine. And then kissing Bellamy. And then Bellamy pulling off her shirt...

She slowly turned her head, wondering if he remembered, worried he might regret it all now that the wind had died and the real world had come back. But he smiled when she looked at him, a wide grin that made his eyes crinkle at the corners. He kissed her, long and lingering.

“Much as I'd like to stay here all day, Princess,” he kissed her nose, “we should probably go make sure that Raven didn't murder Jasper in the night.”

It took them awhile to get dressed, since they kept stopping to kiss. So by the time they opened the door, shoving it through the foot of snow that had piled up against the cabin, the camp was already waking up. People were wandering around, talking and laughing, climbing on top of snowdrifts, happy to be outside again. Clarke could already see that the remains of Mecha Station had taken a beating and parts of the fence would need repair. But it looked like everyone just might be okay. 

“Here, take this,” Bellamy was handing her the half-finished rabbit coat, “It doesn't have sleeves yet, but it'll help.”

“Thanks, but...don't you need it?”

“It was always for you, Princess,” he grinned, helping her pull it on, “You're gonna catch pneumonia walking around without any good clothes on. You want me to get everyone together for a headcount?”

“Yeah, that's probably a good idea.”

As she watched him walk away, Clarke decided that maybe blizzards weren't half-bad after all.


End file.
